Andre Klynsmith

Ports and Terminals

Hapag-Lloyd Locks In Five African Terminals - and Only One of Them Is in SADC

Hapag-Lloyd has agreed to expand its partnership with DP World across five African ports, securing long-term terminal capacity in Dakar, Luanda and Dar es Salaam and backing infrastructure development at Banana in the DRC and Maputo in Mozambique.

Ports and Terminals

18 September 2026 • 4 min read

A carrier that expects to move more than a million TEU across Africa this year has just decided it can no longer rely on buying terminal access when it needs it. The list of ports it picked — and the ports it did not — is the part worth reading twice.

What was actually agreed

The German line announced the expanded cooperation during the week of 14 September. It covers five ports, but not in the same way. In Dakar, Luanda and Dar es Salaam, the agreement is about securing long-term terminal capacity for Hapag-Lloyd — berth and yard access it can count on. At Banana in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Maputo in Mozambique, the language is different: the partnership will “support the development” of port infrastructure.

Hapag-Lloyd disclosed no investment value, no additional capacity figure and no implementation timeline for any of the five. That absence matters when judging how quickly any of this reaches a shipper. Chief Executive Rolf Habben Jansen framed the rationale plainly: “To support this growth, we need reliable infrastructure, sufficient terminal capacity and a network that can scale with our customers.”

Read the two lists separately

Secured capacity is a commitment the carrier has already bought. Development support is an intention. Confusing the two is how shippers end up planning volume around a berth that does not exist yet. On the SADC side of the map, only Luanda sits in the first group. Maputo sits in the second, and no South African, Namibian or Beira call appears anywhere in the announcement.

That is not a snub so much as a statement about where a global carrier currently sees dependable landside throughput. West and East Africa got the firm commitments. Southern Africa got one firm commitment and one promise. Operators who have spent 2026 watching congestion and corridor ratings in the region will recognise the logic even if they do not enjoy it.

Why Maputo is the one to watch

For SADC road freight, Maputo is the entry on this list with the shortest road to a changed workload. It is already the natural sea outlet for Gauteng, Mpumalanga, Limpopo, Eswatini and parts of Zimbabwe, and it is served by the N4 corridor through Lebombo — a route whose transit times have been under visible pressure for months. Any container volume DP World and Hapag-Lloyd add there lands on that road.

Luanda deserves attention for a different reason. Secured liner capacity at Luanda strengthens Angola’s coastal end of the emerging Lobito and southern Angolan trade routes, which matters to northern Namibian and Zambian operators thinking about where DRC-bound and copperbelt cargo will eventually clear. Neither shift happens this quarter. Both are worth tracking as capacity announcements convert into published schedules.

About the Author
	Andre Klynsmith Entrepreneur & Technology Enthusiast Andre's expertise spans technology, blockchain, transport, and logistics — with a passion for innovation and driving positive change across industries. info@laaimylorrie.com | laaimylorrie.com